Album artwork Vs the digital revolution

How many times have you gone into a record store and bought and album simply because the artwork caught your eye?  My answer based on my own opinion is never. Surely you buy your music based on the concept that you actually like it. With album artwork in mind why does it matter about it? We live in a digital world now, and most of our music is stored upon a little device that has a screen of 2.31 inches wide and 4.86 inches long. Do artists care about their artwork, or are they putting all their creativity into the music that you are paying for.

Over the years there have been many artists that have found publicity through the use of controversial cover on their album. Guns ‘N’ Roses have never been a band that are conservative. But the original cover for their album Appetite for Destruction showed an open shirted woman, who looked like she had been raped by a robot, and was then going to be crushed by a metal avenger. Some music channels were refusing to play any of the tracks because of this cover. Due to this it was then changed to show a tattoo that Axl Rose had on his forearm, which was, 5 skulls on a cross.

The Original artwork

            

The artwork that replaced the original

Some would say that it is a bit extreme that people would stop playing the music due to a picture on the front. It is however just a cover, the music on the inside will still sound like it should. The music also may not even represent the actual cover, it could just be that it is there to shock and get people talking. It certainly worked for Axl and the boys, although people were always talking about them.

Rhydian Dafydd the bassist out of the Joy Formidable has always been involved in doing the artwork for the bands releases. He was the artist behind the artwork of the Big Roar. Their second album Wolfs Law featured a wolf lying down with flowers growing out of its body. Dafydd was not the original artist behind this one, but still has strong views on why artwork is so important.

 “I do think it is important that it says something about the songs and lyrics. It kind of goes in tandem with it basically. It is not just that you give it away to commission so that it doesn’t say anything about what you are actually singing about. It is a very important factor.”

With this in mind then it is hard not to see why artwork is not that important. I have asked a number of music fans if they care about the artwork when they are buying an album, 80% of them said no. one even said that buying online can and will “see the end of album artwork at some point.”  For me even when I do download from ITunes, I still have to have the artwork, and it is a pet hate of mine when it doesn’t transfer from ITunes to my IPod. Even when it is just one simple block of colour such as the D.O.Ts And That album. That is just one big block of red. This did not annoy me simply because it was a cover that went with the music, and that it did not look out of place on my IPod. This could be down to me being a little OCD about these things but what the hell.

The D.O.T - And That

You would certainly see this standing out if it was seen in a shop. But that’s the thing this album was available as download only, so was there even a thought put behind this artwork, since it was just download only. Or was this just an ulterior motive on Mike Skinners and Rob Harvey’s behalf. Do they want you to think about the colour? Red is an angry colour, it has a lot of negative connotations, so this could mean something that the D.O.T are trying to get out to the people. On the flipside red can mean passion, love and seduction, so this could also be put into the artist’s music.

When you start a project, then in your head you can always see the finished outcome. A little like putting an outfit together in your head whilst shopping. Well when girls go shopping.  You buy separate items in different shops see a picture in your head and you have the end result. It seems that some bands are not to keen on doing this, they are pretty happy just to give away the artwork to anyone, have a little in put and use the finished product.

Maybe now that the digital revolution is taking over and CDs don’t really have much future, we shouldn’t be bothered about what is on the album cover? Or do we feel cheated that we are paying for something with only half the effort put into the product?

I personally like to see the artwork of bands and see the link between the music and the cover. That way if the album is not up to much I still have a pretty picture to look at.

Rochelle Massey